SANTA FE – Families for around 39,520 New Mexico school-aged students grade level K-12 will receive benefits on May 22, 2022, to reimburse them for free and reduced-price school meals missed due to COVID-related absences.

Approximately $2,384,826 in Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT) will be issued to cover meals K-12 students missed in December 2021 and January 2022, after schools returned to in-person learning. The issuance amount is $7.10 per day the child was absent from school due to COVID.

Beginning May 24, parents and guardians will be able to check whether their child qualified for the latest P-EBT issuance at the VERIFY P-EBT Information section of the Human Services Department’s YesNM portal.  

“Good nutrition is essential fuel to focus and learn in school as well as grow in life,” said Angela Medrano, deputy cabinet secretary for the New Mexico Human Services Department. “The goal of this assistance is to not just reimburse families, but to also help provide continued care for New Mexico’s children.”

If your child has a P-EBT card, please keep the card and do not destroy it. If a new address or guardian was reported to the school, a new P-EBT card will be sent to the new address.

For questions regarding your child’s P-EBT card, you can contact NM PEBT Hotline at 1-833-415-0569. For questions regarding absences reported for your child, contact the child’s school.

Answers to other frequently asked questions can also be found online at: https://www.hsd.state.nm.us/lookingforassistance/p-ebt/

HSD would like to remind New Mexicans who receive SNAP food benefits that they can double up food bucks and purchase more fruits and vegetables when they spend SNAP EBT card dollars at participating farmers markets, farm stands, mobile markets and grocery stores. For example, if you spend $10 from your SNAP EBT Card at a participating outlet, they will give you another $10 to buy fresh fruits and veggies grown in New Mexico. There are nearly 80 locations across New Mexico. Learn more at: https://www.doubleupnm.org/.

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The department wants to ensure our clients of uninterrupted access to the benefits available to them. The easiest way to do this is to make sure contact information is up-to-date on the YesNM website: www.yes.state.nm.us. Users can simply and easily update their address using the chat functionality there. Step-by-step directions on how to update your address are available here. Individuals seeking to apply for or check their SNAP benefits may apply online through www.yes.state.nm.us or by phone at 1-800-283-4465

We talk, interpret and smile in all languages.  We provide written information to our customers in both English and Spanish and interpretation services are available in 58 languages through our provider, CTS Language Link. For our hearing, and speech impaired customers, we utilize Relay New Mexico, a free 24-hour service that ensures equal communication access via the telephone to individuals who are deaf, hard of hearing, deaf-blind or speech disabled.

The Human Services Department provides services and benefits to 1,065,029 New Mexicans through several programs including: the Medicaid Program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Child Support Program, and several Behavioral Health Services.

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